Numbers Worth Knowing: How We Think About Project Metrics

Embarking on a project is like setting sail on an epic adventure - a quest for success sprinkled with challenges, triumphs, and enough coffee to power a small army.

As you can imagine, before we start our journey, just like setting sail, we have to make sure our rigging is right, our people are ready, and we at least roughly know our destination.  Recently, we helped a client work on a fast and furious front end project to bring their ideas to life with a very aggressive 3 month timeline. After delivery, we took some time to take a look at what it means to partner, even for a short time, simply to show what it takes to foster a collaborative environment.  We’ve crunched the numbers to show you what you could expect in working on a custom build product development project.

In this blog post, we're not just diving into the intricate metrics of our project but also infusing it with a generous dose of humor because, let's face it, laughter makes any journey more enjoyable, and, full disclosure, the author of this post loves idioms. Join us on this joyous ride as we explore the metrics that defined our project, where 9 dedicated Foxboxers and 6 client folks joined forces.

Inception and who’s who?

• A team of 9 Foxboxers and 6 client folks – because, as the saying goes, "Two heads are better than one," and apparently, 15 heads are even better. Each person played a key role in delivering the end result, and as you can imagine, 15 people keeps a project manager busy!
• 1 meticulously crafted Figma file with dozens of iterations – it's like a treasure map, but for our application. X marks the pixel-perfect spot, and once again, collaboration and calibration gave us exactly what we needed to bring our client’s vision to life.

UI Delivery Metrics:

• 148 Jira issues developed, reviewed, merged, QAed, and closed – With a mix of user stories, subtasks, bugs, and chores, it’s crucial to always log the work you’re doing, both for transparency and for documentation.
• An average sprint velocity of 64 – we're not saying we're faster than a cheetah, but have you ever seen a cheetah close a Jira ticket? Yeah, we didn't think so.
• 9 demo meetings were held – because we believe in transparency, and also, we had to show off all those beautiful UI features to someone other than ourselves. Without the demo, we would not be able to speak to our hard work, nor would our client be able to tell us what they’re seeing, and if what we built met their expectations.

Automated Testing Metrics:

• 32% automated test coverage achieved – like a warm, automated security blanket, ensuring our code doesn't get the chills. We believe in covering our code like we cover our late-night snack cravings – thoroughly and without compromise.  What does this look like?  Well,  we automed the happy path most of our users will take.  This is important to create a benchmark of what the tests will look like, and to free up our awesome QA engineer to file bugs and write test cases.
• 169 PRs expertly merged – because nothing says "team spirit" like a well-merged pull request, or in our case, a code-coordinated group hug.

QA Metrics:

• 125 manual test cases written and leveraged – proving that sometimes, a human touch is necessary, especially when the machines get a little too binary. We like to think of manual testing as the project's spa day – indulgent, meticulous, and oh-so-necessary, cucumbers on the eyes are optional of course.

Communication Metrics:

• 2,300 Slack messages exchanged – because sometimes, the best project decisions are made with GIFs, emojis, and the occasional pun.
• 98 Daily Standups - Ever heard the phrase, "A stitch in time saves nine"? Well, spending 15 minutes collaborating daily is our version of that wisdom. While Slack is the heartbeat of our remote work, there's magic in face-to-face (well, screen-to-screen) conversations. When it comes to clarifying a user story, hashing it out in real-time during our standups beats waiting for those Slack messages to ping back and forth. Sometimes, a quick chat saves hours of back-and-forth typing!

Conclusion

As the project unfolded over 3 months, the metrics weren't just numbers; they were a testament to our unwavering focus and the output of every single one of the actions we took each day. From the inception where our diverse team united, to the meticulous crafting of the UI, and the comprehensive testing processes, resilience and collaboration were our secret sauce, and maybe now you can imagine what working together could look like for you!